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The Book Review
Draft for Publish on 2024-12-27
00:16:22
The Book Review podcast is off for the holidays, but please enjoy this episode of the The New York Times's Culture Desk show from earlier this fall in which reporter Alexandra Alter talks to author Susanna Clarke upon the 20th anniversary of her masterful fantasy novel “Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell.”
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- [00:08]
Gilbert Cruz
I'm Gilbert Cruz, editor of the New York Times Book Review, and this is the Book Review podcast. We're officially off for the holidays, but we couldn't help but give you a little end of year treat. Earlier this fall, our reporter Alexandra Alter wrote a wonderful profile of the author Susanna Clarke upon the anniversary of her tremendous fantasy novel, Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell. Alexandra visited Clark at her cottage in the English countryside and recorded a short episode on that trip that we're happy to share with you all. Now.
- [00:47]
Alexandra Alter
You know, when some people think about fantasy, they think about dragons and fairies and elves, and it all seems so escapist and magical. But I think what some of the best fantasy fiction does is it makes us look more closely at reality and think about it in way. I'm Alexandra Alter and I write about books, publishing and the literary world for the New York Times. Twenty years ago, the novelist Susanna Clarke published a really unusual book that changed the fantasy landscape almost overnight. The book is an 800 page historical fantasy novel titled Jonathan Strange and Mr. Narrell, and it's set in Regent Sierra, England. It tells the story of these two rival magicians who are trying to revive the lost art of English magic. It was a huge bestseller that went on to sell more than 4 million copies. And when the novel came out, it launched Clarke, who at the time was in her mid-40s and working as a cookbook editor, as one of Britain's greatest fantasy novelists. People compared her to CS Lewis and Tolkien and others compared her to Jane Austen and Charles Dickens. And it blurred the lines between fantasy and literary fiction in this really interesting way. It was nominated for the Booker Prize and it won the Hugo Award, which is a huge fantasy prize. Clark's fans and literary critics were all waiting to see what she would do next. People were expecting a sequel to Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell because she had a second book on contract and she had indicated that she was interested in writing a sequel. But almost as suddenly as she had appeared on the literary scene, Clarke seemed to disappear. And then, you know, nobody heard from her for a while. But finally it was almost 20 years later when she released a Second, and it wasn't the novel anyone was expecting from her. This novel, Piranesi, is a very short and philosophical novel. And when that came out, readers were ecstatic that she'd written something new. Critics were stunned that she had done something so different. And some people said, you know, this is proof that Susanna Clarke is not only one of the greatest fantasy writers of her generation, but just one of the greatest writers period. Her impact is enormous, but her output has been relatively small and particularly in genre fiction, fantasy and science fiction and romance. Authors who have a large following typically produce novels more quickly and will do a series or something like that, and that's sort of what they become known for. But for her to publish just two novels and to have such an incredible impact and to be so widely known and beloved is pretty unusual. When I found out that on this 20th anniversary of Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norell, she's publishing a new fable like short story called the Wood in Midwinter, which is about a girl who can communicate with trees and animals and disappears into the forest, I knew I wanted to talk to her. The main thing I wanted to know about Susannah Clark was first of all how she had written these two books, which are both considered to be masterpieces, but almost couldn't be more different. And also what had happened to her creatively in the intervening years between 2004 and 2020. Where did she go? What did she. How did she write? How. How would she continue to work? And also I was curious where she sees her writing going now. Okay, here, this is. So maybe I can just set it here actually, and that will pick you up perfectly. It's so quiet. So even though Clark is a deeply private person, she welcomed me into her home. She lives in a tiny limestone cottage in this charming small village in England's Peak District, which is in the countryside. It's in the northern part and it's known for its rugged moorlands and these lush valleys. And the village that she lives in is surrounded by sheep filled pastures. And it was amazing to sort of see where she sits and writes every day on this brown leather sofa. If you could just introduce yourself, say your name and you know. Author of Remember?
- [05:07]
Susanna Clarke
Yes. Hi, I'm Susanna Clark and I'm the author of Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell Piranesi and the Wood at Midwinter.
- [05:18]
Alexandra Alter
Clark is in her mid-60s and has this silvery white bob and deep brown eyes and she has this soft spoken voice, but it's very commanding in its way. And she, when she talks, she had a habit of kind of letting her gaze drift out the window to these trees that she likes to look at when she's writing or meditating.
- [05:40]
Susanna Clarke
There are three trees.
- [05:42]
Alexandra Alter
One thing I noticed in her living room, which is somewhat unusual for a novelist, is in addition to many piles of books, which is typical, Clark has a lot of dolls and stuffed animals. And while we were talking she was holding this stuffed pig in her Lap.
- [05:57]
Susanna Clarke
Some people do things as a child and then when they grow up, they put off childish things, and I'm not very good at that. I don't really see the point of growing up.
- [06:08]
Alexandra Alter
I was really curious to hear about her childhood.
- [06:11]
Susanna Clarke
I think as a child I wanted to be a writer because books were. Books were home in a way that other places weren't.
- [06:25]
Alexandra Alter
Clark told me a little bit about growing up as the daughter of a Methodist minister. In addition to moving all around, they also had the kind of household where she said, displays of emotion were discouraged, couldn't get too excited, too happy or too sad.
- [06:40]
Susanna Clarke
So in literature and in fantasy, there was some representation of emotion. There was ecstasy and terror and fear and loathing and love. And I think a lot of what people look for in different sorts of art is emotion, it's colour.
- [07:01]
Alexandra Alter
She found an emotional outlet in fantasy novels.
- [07:04]
Susanna Clarke
This is a bit of a sweeping comment, but a lot of literature of the late 20th century was hyper focused on the human. That was sort of deemed the only thing that novels should be about was about human feelings and human reactions and human relationships and fantasy. I think, particularly with Lewis and Tolkien and people who followed, allows you to look away from the human to the other.
- [07:36]
Alexandra Alter
What is it that attracts you, do you feel, as a reader and as a writer, to fantasy and things with surreal elements?
- [07:43]
Susanna Clarke
I don't know that I can articulate it very well, but to me it's sort of an obvious thing to do with literature. Other people have kind of metaphors. Fantasy literature is a sort of metaphor. Instead of saying, he was so exhilarated, he felt as if he was flying. In Harry Potter, the kids actually take off.
- [08:10]
Alexandra Alter
And this connection she felt to fantasy, you know, wasn't something she left off in childhood. It stayed with her and grew over time.
- [08:18]
Susanna Clarke
I think fantasy's got a line to the unconscious and I think the most interesting work comes from the unconscious. Hence I think I've always felt quite at home with surrealism.
- [08:33]
Alexandra Alter
She ended up studying economics, politics and philosophy at Oxford, and she told me she wasn't the best student. She kept writing on the side and even wrote part of a detective novel, but she never could finish it.
- [08:47]
Susanna Clarke
I tried to give up writing and it hadn't taken. I just started again almost immediately. I thought, this is hopeless. I can't write a book and I can't not write a book. This is really. This is just very, very difficult situation.
- [09:00]
Alexandra Alter
And then when she was teaching English in Spain in the 1990s, she had this kind of turning point. She picked up these novels by Tolkien that she had read, you know, when she was younger. And she had this realization, I should be writing fantasy. That's the genre that she's always loved. And she decided that, you know, to continue writing, she would need to move back to England. She felt her writing roots were at home. And what she wrote eventually morphed into the novel that would become Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell. It took her about a decade to do all the research, and at one point, the manuscript grew to be more than a thousand pages. Eventually, she did find an agent, and they sent out a partial version of the manuscript. And Clark and her husband, the science fiction and fantasy writer Colin Greenland, were both kind of braced for what they thought would be a pretty modest reception.
- [10:00]
Susanna Clarke
I kind of think what I do is so peculiar and a product of my rather peculiar imagination. I didn't think that people would be interested in Stranger, nor it seemed quite a long way from what other people were doing.
- [10:19]
Alexandra Alter
She had all these footnotes that were referring to the history and practice and theory of English magic. Some of the footnotes are entire short stories. And she assumed no publisher would take on this whole thing. Then, to Clark's surprise and delight, Bloomsbury made an offer to publish it. With the footnotes and everything, they decided to print 250,000 copies, which is a huge amount for a debut novelist and even huger for an 800 page, very unusual historical fantasy novel. And it was a huge overnight blockbuster. Was it unnerving to be suddenly the object of so much attention?
- [11:04]
Susanna Clarke
The first time I went to my publishers, I met a lot of people, and one of them came up to me later and said, you had this expression on your face like somebody was going to come out and say, this is a joke. She said, you looked very suspicious, which I probably did.
- [11:26]
Alexandra Alter
After her book tour, Clark was really, I think, looking forward to things quieting down. She had this new novel that she wanted to get started on. But one night she started to feel really strange, a little bit dizzy, nauseous. And she stood up and just took a few steps and collapsed onto the floor. Suddenly, she was overcome by exhaustion. She was getting migraines, having sensitivity to light. And the worst part for her as a writer was she had terrible brain fog. She couldn't sometimes finish a sentence when she was trying to write. Suddenly her thoughts were impossible to get down in a logical order. And this went on for months, and then it went on for years.
- [12:11]
Susanna Clarke
This sort of dread was just horrible.
- [12:14]
Alexandra Alter
Clark was later diagnosed with chronic fatigue syndrome. The ideas were still Coming. But it was really difficult for her to string everything together in a narrative. She said at one point, you know, she stopped even thinking of herself as a writer.
- [12:29]
Susanna Clarke
But then the BBC booked Jonathan Strange, Mr. Norrell as a television series. And I was invited to go up to Yorkshire to see them film it. And that was. That was kind of a revelation, partly because I sort of arrived. Then I got treated as an author, which I really no longer thought of myself as. I just thought of myself as this ill woman. That was a bit of a turning point. I just felt, well, maybe I can write again. These people seem to think I'm a writer. Possibly I am.
- [13:10]
Alexandra Alter
Once Clark felt she was able to write again, she realized that she probably couldn't undertake the sequel to Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, which would have required a ton of historical research and would have been another massive, complicated historical novel. And she started writing something completely different. Piranesi is so surreal and abstract in some ways. It's about a man who is trapped in an imaginary labyrinth where he lives basically alone with birds and these occasional ocean tides that wash through. And it's kind of a mystery. It's kind of this surreal philosophical novel. And Clark realized by the time she was almost done with the novel that it really closely paralleled her own experience. She realized the narrator was also, you know, alone and cut off from society, but wasn't particularly sad about it.
- [14:03]
Susanna Clarke
I was writing about someone who was in a fairly isolated position, but who was able to find a huge amount in that.
- [14:15]
Alexandra Alter
I think what makes Susanna Clark's fantasy world stand out is the way that she conjures this reality. It feels so much like the real world, but it's a little bit. There's something surreal about it, but it doesn't feel like anything escapist. It's sort of this deeper look at the potential for magic in our world. And I think with, particularly with Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, it felt like you were reading real historical fiction. Then suddenly someone does some magic, right? Now, in addition to the novel that she's working on that connects back to the world of strange and earliest, Clark is also working on what sounds like a very different novel. She described it to me as an anti horror novel. There's something like a secret, but it's the opposite of horrifying. It's something sublime and joyful. So I found that fascinating to see that she's planning to go in an entirely different direction.
- [15:14]
Susanna Clarke
I've only ever had any success by doing my own weird thing, following the path that's in front of me. Somebody said to me, pray the way you can, not the way you think you're supposed to. And I think that's the same for writing. Write the way you can and not the way people tell you you're supposed to.
- [15:39]
Alexandra Alter
I think at this particular moment also, the world seems so volatile. The news can be so upsetting. A lot of us are really drawn to fantasy fiction because it's a way to kind of explore our emotions and sublimate them in this sort of magical landscape.
- [15:56]
Susanna Clarke
If you could get sort of a bit further beyond your ego and the sort of ways in which we trap ourselves, if you could just see the world beyond, I think it, you know, it would be miraculous.